Perun and the limits of Google Translate.

I've mentioned that I'm taking a couple of classes during this year's legislative session, just to keep things, y'know, interesting. One of them is on Cernunnos, the Celtic god of the forest, animals and the hunt (among other things); His most famous image is found on the Gundestrup Cauldron, which was unearthed from a peat bog in Denmark in 1891. Despite the cauldron having been found in the Balkans, experts say it's of Celtic origin. Here's Cernunnos on the cauldron: 

Stolen from https://balkancelts.wordpress.com/2016/09/06/the-gundestrup-ghosts-hidden-images-in-the-gundestrup-cauldron/

I grew up in the woods, but I have never had a strong affinity with Cernunnos. Still, the class has been worth taking; it's always good to learn new things. And it may have led me to something else.

While watching the final class video, for some reason I began thinking about Perun, the Slavic god of thunder. Perun has some attributes in common with Thor -- they're both red haired and they both wield a hammer and lightning bolts -- but Perun has a bigger role in the Slavic pantheon than Thor does in the Norse, as Perun has been billed as the supreme god of the Slavs. Now, feel free to take that with a grain of salt. As usual, the chroniclers were Christian, and so they were predisposed to view polytheist pantheons through the lens of "there's gotta be One Big God because that's how it works for us". So maybe Perun is the main dude, but maybe he's coequal with Veles, the Slavic god of the underworld and the animals and is sometimes depicted in the guise of a dragon. He and Perun have an epic fight in the skies at the end of winter every year, complete with thunder and lightning, and Veles is always defeated, and then it's spring.

Anyway, Perun played a part in Dragon's Web, the first book in the Pipe Woman's Legacy series, so I included Him in A Billion Gods and Goddesses, the companion book to the Pipe Woman universe's mythology. And in that book, I mentioned that I'd found among my mother's things a little songbook that had been produced, I'm assuming in the 1930s or '40s, by a Czech printer in Cicero, Illinois, and in that songbook was a song that I believed called on Perun to fight against Hitler and free Czechoslovakia. When that memory came up, I was sitting at my desk; I opened my desk drawer, and there it was.

Here's a photo of the song I was thinking of. The verse numbered 2, toward the bottom of the page, is the one that mentions Hitler and Perun: 

Lynne Cantwell 2025

My Czech is extremely rusty and was never great to start with. So I figured I'd plug the verse into Google Translate, right? So I did, and...hmm. 

Lynne Cantwell 2025

Wait a minute. Perun would be thrown into hell? They're equating the top Slavic god with Hitler? I mean, the Czechs had been Christianized for a long time by then (nowadays the country is largely atheist), but man, I dunno.

I sure hope someone who knows more Czech than me reads this. I was sure that Czech-Americans were asking for Perun's help in defeating Hitler -- and given that success, and what we're up against in Washington right now, I was all set to petition Perun for some help for our side.

I asked Mama Google about any connections between Perun and the Czechs in World War II, and I did find a publication that mentions a branch of the Czech intelligence, "responsible for sabotage and subversive operations", that was codenamed Perun. It's kind of sad that the Czechs made their mightiest god go undercover to beat Hitler. But at least He did fight against Hitler -- or anyway, some Czech operatives fought against the Germans in His name.

And it beats the fate of Lugh, the Irish god of light -- the guy who could do anything -- who in later years was turned into a leprechaun.

***

These moments of questionable bloggy translations have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Hang in there!

A Seasons new year.

I promised y'all a twofer for holiday ficlets this year, didn't I? 

Last week I posted the Pipe Woman's Legacy and Elemental Keys mashup. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. 

I said I'd do one for Seasons of the Fool this week. It turns out that I did a ficlet for Seasons last year. I went back and re-read it -- and despaired, kind of. It was so hopeful. We we banking so much on the vaccines letting us return to our normal lives -- or I was, at least. But here we are, with variants come and gone (the original virus and beta) and one virulent variant (delta) now being supplanted by an even scarier one. 

I don't know that I can muster as much hope as I did last year. But I'm going to take a crack at it, because I promised I would. Here we go.

✨

Julia looked out the window of Dave's summer house in Michiana -- or rather, hers and Dave's since their marriage. It was New Year's Eve, but she wasn't feeling very festive. She had hoped for snow, but there wasn't any -- just some icy patches along the side of the road. The woods looked wan, devoid of their customary winter blanket.

Her grandparents' cottage -- the house where she'd grown up -- was dark. She and Dave had agreed that it made better sense to gather in the larger house this year. The whole family would be here tonight. They needed more space to spread out. 

Well, everybody would be here except for Randi. Her college suitemate had tested positive at the end of finals week, so Randi was spending most of her winter break quarantined at home in Chicago. Rich was fine, but his high school would be doing remote learning again starting next week. Little Raylee was still going to school for now. At least she was finally vaccinated. When she got her first shot, Julia had been the one to cry -- with relief.

Ed Starek had refused to get the shot; the virus claimed him in September. Now his house was up for sale.

The only lights she could see were in Ms. Elsie and Ms. Thea's windows. She glanced down at the two COVID test kits she held.

Dave came up behind her and put his arms around her. "I thought you were leaving," he said.

She leaned back against him. "I was." She weighed the test kits in her hand. "Do you think they'll do it?"

He chuckled. "That's the fourth time you've asked me. Just go. You won't know 'til you've asked them."

"I know." She sighed. "Let me get my coat."

Down the street she trudged, test kits in her pocket and mask firmly in place. She knocked on the door. "Just a minute," Ms. Thea called, the door muffling her voice. After a moment, the latch clicked and the door opened. "Julia," Ms. Thea said, her eyes smiling above her mask. "It's so nice to see you."

"I've missed you both so much," Julia blurted, her own eyes filling with tears.

"There, there, dear. Come in." Ms. Thea opened the door wider. 

"Are you sure?" she said, even she stepped inside.

"If you don't stay long, it's fine. They're saying fifteen minutes now, aren't they?" Ms. Thea gave her a hug and shut the door. "Else, look who's here."

"Oh, Julia," said Ms. Elsie, emerging from the kitchen. She donned a mask in a hurry and enveloped Julia in a hug.

Julia cried into her shoulder for a moment as Ms. Thea patted her back. Then she stepped away. "Well, about that fifteen minutes. Dave and I wondered whether you'd like to come over tonight for a little while. It'll be just the family. Randi's quarantining at home, but Rich and Raylee are here. And Tim and Jen are coming."

"Oh," Ms. Thea said, looking at Ms. Elsie.

"The only thing is that you'd need to do this first," Julia said, fumbling in her pocket for the test kits. She held them out. "I'm sorry. But we're having everyone do it."

The ladies smiled. "Put those back in your pocket," Ms. Elsie said. "We've already tested ourselves so we could go to the senior center tonight. They're moving up the clock so we can toast the New Year at eight!" 

"But I'd rather be with you and your family," Ms. Thea confided. 

"So would I," Ms. Elsie said. "It'll be a lot more fun than drinking sparkling cider with a bunch of old people."

Julia laughed. "I'm so glad you're coming."

Ms. Elsie said, "The cards were right, weren't they, Thea?"

Ms. Thea nodded. "Yes, indeed. The Tower is still falling, but the Wheel of Fortune is ever turning. We'll just have to be careful."

"That's the ticket," Ms. Elsie agreed. "We'll see you tonight, Julia."

Lynne Cantwell 2021

✨

These moments of careful blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Get vaxxed!

Solstice sunrise; and Jerry's story concludes (for now).

'Tis the season for gifts, and I have two for you today. 

Gift #1: The final book (for now) in the Atherton Vampire series is out. 

The Atherton Vampire III: Midnight Creeps is just 99 cents until January 6th. And if you've been waiting for the whole trilogy before starting to read, well, all three books are priced at 99 cents apiece. Enjoy!

✨

Gift #2: The winter solstice ficlet has become a hearth/myth tradition. (A ficlet, if you're just joining us, is a very short story of between 750 and 1,000 words.)

My head's been full of vampires for most of this year, and vampires don't really lend themselves to winter sunrises and hot chocolate. Plus Callie and Jerry's story has just barely gotten to Halloween. It seems a little premature to give them a winter ficlet this year.

So a couple of days ago, I asked folks on Facebook which series I should set this year's ficlet in. There were several votes for the Pipe Woman Chronicles and zero for The Elemental Keys. Surprisingly, the write-in vote for Seasons of the Fool was strong. 

So here's what I'm going to do: This year, y'all will get a twofer -- the Pipe Woman Chronicles (with a couple of special guests) today, and Seasons next Sunday. Happy holidays!

✨

"This was a brilliant idea, little brother," I groused. We stood, in the dark, just inside the entrance to Newgrange, the Neolithic chamber tomb. It was two days before the winter solstice. And I could tell a thick cloud cover would obscure the sunrise.

"C'mon, Sage," said my husband Rafe. Our daughter Kerry slept in his arms, her head pillowed on his shoulder. "Cut the guy some slack."

I glared at him. "But we came here for nothing," I said. "First Webb drags us all the way to Ireland with this cockamamie story about getting in ahead of the crowds. Then he gets me to talk Cerridwen into arranging the admittance for us – which I did. And it's going to be too cloudy to see!" I glanced at my niece, Sora, staring at me with huge eyes. She held Webb's forefinger with one hand and her mother Hilary's forefinger with the other. Their son George slept in a sling on Hilary's chest. Both kids shared their mother’s Asian features and their father’s dark brown curls.

"Don't be a jerk, Sage," Webb said. "Maybe it'll clear up."

I raised my eyebrows in a passable imitation of Mom's skeptical look.

"Let's just go inside," Hilary said. "The kids are getting cold." So in we tramped, Rafe leading the way down the narrow passage with the flashlight on his phone.

Webb halted for a moment and pointed up. "See there, Sora?" he said. "The sun's gonna come in through that box above the doorway and light up this whole hallway, all the way to the back wall."

"If the clouds miraculously part," I said.

"Oh, ye of little faith," Webb chided. Sometimes I hate that know-it-all confidence of his.

As we approached the back of the tomb, Hilary slowed. "Is someone else here?"

I could hear it, too – voices, whispering in one of the side tombs. "Hello?" I called. 

The voices ceased. Then two heads poked out from the doorway to the side tomb. "Oh," the woman said faintly. She was tiny – short and willowy – and wore her ginger hair in a ponytail. Her face looked familiar somehow.

The man was also short, but stocky, with brown hair and a bushy beard. He stepped into the main chamber, blocking our way. "You’re trespassing," he declared. "By whose authority are you here?"

"Cerridwen's," I said. "The goddess Cerridwen gave us leave to come."

He guffawed. "Cerridwen? She’s not even Irish!" 

"She’s Celtic," I argued. “That's close enough."

"It's not," the man said. "Begone."

Rafe's forehead furrowed. "Who the hell are you to kick us out?"

Webb moved next to my husband and touched his arm. "That's Collum Barth," my brother said in an undertone. "And that's Raney Meadows with him." 

"That's why you looked so familiar!" I said. These two were Elementals. They and two companions had saved the Earth – and turned the world Technicolor in the process. Kerry had been enchanted. "We all loved the movie about your adventures."

"Yes, well, who the hell are you to have gotten Cerridwen's leave to be here?" Collum demanded.

"Webb Curtis," said my brother, reaching out to shake Collum's hand. "My wife Hilary." She nodded and smiled. "My brother-in-law Rafe Orloff. And that's my sister Sage." He gave them a lopsided grin. "I guess we're all kind of in the same business."

Raney's mouth dropped open. She elbowed Collum. "Don't be a jerk. You know who these people are, right?"

"Yeah, but Da said we'd be the only ones here," said Collum. He turned to us. "Sorry."

"It's fine," I said. "It's not like it matters. None of us are going to see anything – it's too cloudy."

My niece sidled up to Raney. "I'm Sora," she said with a bright smile. "I'm four."

Raney grinned down at her. "Hi, Sora. Do you know Barney's theme song?"

"You two can sing anything you want, as long as it's not Baby Shark," I said.

"I can make the sun come out," Sora told Raney. "We just have to have a party!"

Kerry raised her sleepy head from Rafe's shoulder. "That's not how it works," she said.

"Yes, it is!" Sora insisted. She tugged on Kerry’s foot. "Come on!" 

"All right." Kerry squirmed until Rafe put her down. Together the girls raced back to the tomb entrance and began to sing.

Webb turned an inquiring gaze on Hilary. "It's my fault," she admitted. "I told them a legend the other day about Amaterasu, the Shinto sun goddess. The gods tricked Her into leaving Her cave by throwing a party."

I looked at Rafe. "It's roughly analogous," he said. 

"It'll never work," Collum scoffed. "A Shinto goddess in Ireland?"

"We've seen weirder things," I said, and led the way to where the kids were now yelling at the top of their lungs. By the grace of the gods, they were not singing Baby Shark, so I joined in. One by one, the others did the same.

A golden glow descended from the sky and landed before us, resolving into the form of Amaterasu. She wore a flowing white kimono and a radiant smile. "Who calls Me to this rainy land?" She asked.

The little girls clapped. "We want to see the sun inside!" Sora cried. She pointed to the roof box. "You have to shine in there so we can see!"

"Very well," the goddess said. She raised both hands and directed a stream of light through the roof box. The little girls cheered again and pelted inside. "Mommy!" Sora yelled. "Come see! It's beautiful!"

Hilary bowed to the goddess. "Thank You."

"It was the least I could do for the child," She said. "She will be a bright spot when it's needed most."

Webb and Hilary stared at each other. "Here we go again," he said with a laugh. 

The glowing chamber was just as impressive as Webb had said it would be. I hate it when he's right.

Screenshot of 2020 winter solstice sunrise at Newgrange

✨

Once again this year, Ireland's Office of Public Works will sponsor a live webcast of the winter solstice sunrise at Newgrange. They'll do it for three straight mornings, starting tonight US time (it's at 8:45am Monday the 20th UTC, which is 3:45am Eastern time, 2:45am Central, 1:45am Mountain, and 12:45am Pacific -- so yeah, overnight tonight for those of us in the US). Details at the link. The hour is early for the US and it may be cloudy all three days -- but when it works, it's glorious.

✨

These moments of bright blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Get vaxxed!

A moment of serendipity.

Sometimes a scene just comes together. 
Lynne Cantwell | 2021

Earlier this week, Big Al's Books and Pals re-ran a review of Spider's Lifeline, the third book in my Pipe Woman's Legacy series, which came out in 2016. It was a moment of serendipity for me, as I'd been thinking about the book just a few days before. And that reminded me of a moment of serendipity that occurred while I was writing the fourth and final book, Turtle's Weir. 

You may have heard the term "Easter egg" in relation to movies. An Easter egg is a scene in which the filmmakers have included an inside joke, or a moment that makes a reference that only diehard fans would understand. Here's an example of one that occurred in Raiders of the Lost Ark: Hieroglyphs cover the walls of the room where Indiana Jones finds the Ark of the Covenant -- and among those hieroglyphs are drawings of R2D2 and C3PO, two of the most beloved droids in the Star Wars movies. It makes sense when you realize George Lucas both invented the Star Wars saga and co-wrote the story on which the Indiana Jones movies were based, and Harrison Ford starred in both movie franchises.

Writers include Easter eggs, too. Often, it's intentional, but sometimes the moments write themselves. The latter was the case in Webb's half of the Pipe Woman's Legacy. 

There's a scene in Spider's Lifeline in which Webb and his mother, Naomi Witherspoon Curtis, attend a reception hosted by former President Brock Holt and his wife, Antonia Greco, in honor of an Icelandic princess named Ingrid. Brock and Antonia's sons, Rex and Roman, are also there. Roman is a free spirit -- a musician who is as much of a Trickster as is Webb himself. There's a moment where Webb goes to the bar to get himself and his mother something to drink. Roman joins him there, and while they're chatting, Naomi shakes hands with the princess and then drops to the floor.

Antonia and I reached her at the same time. I helped her to a sitting position as Antonia clucked over her and called for her husband to get their physician. Cameras clicked again; I expected we’d be the top story on tonight’s news.

“No doctors,” Mom said crossly. “I’m fine. I just took a tumble, that’s all – it happens when you’re old. Thank you, Roman.” She took her drink from his hand and sipped.

“Yeah, thanks, buddy,” I said, accepting my own from him.

“I’m here to help,” he said, in a more serious tone than I’d ever heard him use before. “Remember that.”

What caused Roman to turn serious right then? I had no idea at the time.

But then in Turtle's Weir, Webb made a return trip to the moment via time travel get a better view of what had happened, and Roman's reaction became a little clearer.

As Webb-in-the-timeline broke from the bar to scramble toward Mom, I glanced around the room. Ingrid watched what she had wrought with satisfaction in her eye. But then she glanced up from the tableau on the rug at me – not Webb-in-the-timeline, but me, Webb-the-observer. Her eyebrows shot up and her mouth dropped open. Then her forehead creased in anger.

I covered my own shock with a jaunty little wave. Then, as I got ready to spring up out of the timeline, I noticed someone else in the room was watching me: Roman Holt. He was crouched next to me on the floor, holding my drink and Mom’s. And of the three of us – Roman, Ingrid, and me – he was the only one who didn’t look surprised that I was there.

In real life, right after he’d handed us our drinks, he’d told me, I’m here to help. Remember that. The comment had seemed to come from out of the blue at the time. Now, at least, I had a little context.

I gave him a shrug and a grin, and got out of there.

Thanks, Webb, for clearing that up for all of us. And thanks to Big Al and the pals for the reprise review.

***

I'd like to say I've made progress on the second Atherton Vampire story this week, but I'd be lying. Real-life events have sucked up much of my focus for the past few days. But serendipity strikes again! The next session of Camp NaNo starts Thursday. So all I have to do is draft an outline for the story by then. Piece of cake.

***

These moments of bloggy serendipity have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Get vaxxed!

We have winners!

It's nearly moving day for us here at La Casa Cantwell, and we have all hit the stage where we are so totally over it.

The old place looks like a disaster area, but nearly everything is packed. Today (and yesterday -- long story, don't ask) we finished assembling the wardrobe at the new place. The movers will be here bright and early tomorrow morning.

And you, my friends, are the most awesome ever, because I will not have to move those two sets (13 books each!) of the paperback editions of the books in the Pipe Woman Chronicles universe.

Please help me congratulate Stephanie Grant and Amanda Smith, the winners of the giveaway! Ladies, I've emailed you for your addresses so I know where to send your books. (If you don't see my email, please check your spam folder.)

I'd love to write more tonight, but I still have to pack up the kitchen (aieeeee...). Thanks to everyone for playing -- you're the best!

***
These moments of bloggy winning have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Moving sale.

Moving. Ugh.

I mentioned last week that we're moving to a new apartment. Along with the usual packing and sorting and packing, we spent several hours yesterday at IKEA. I spent most of today at the new place, assembling the wardrobe I bought yesterday. Good times.

Anyway, there's a lot of packing still to be done, but one thing I would like to not have to pack are a bunch of paperback books in inventory. I bought several copies of each of the books in the Pipe Woman Chronicles last year, intending to run a giveaway on Goodreads...and forgot. The good news is that I now have two -- count 'em, two -- full sets of the three series to give away to you, faithful hearth/myth readers.

Sorry that the photos of the prizes are so awful. The lighting was bad and I've already packed my book stands. But all the books there! In order, they are:

The Pipe Woman Chronicles
Seized
Fissured
Tapped
Gravid
Annealed

Land, Sea, Sky
Crosswind
Undertow
Scorched Earth

Pipe Woman's Legacy
Dragon's Web
Firebird's Snare
Spider's Lifeline
Turtle's Weir

And the second edition of A Billion Gods and Goddesses: The Mythology of the Pipe Woman Chronicles.

The fun starts tonight and ends Saturday night, May 5th, at 7:00pm Eastern time. Unfortunately, I can only afford to ship these sets to folks in the US and Canada. (I also have a couple of sets of the Transcendence series that I meant to give away in this contest, but I realized I'd already packed them. So I guess I'll be giving those away next month -- and since there are only three books in that series, I'll be able to ship them anywhere.)

Of course, the usual and customary rules apply:

1. Friends and family may definitely enter.
2. Winners of previous contests may win again.
3. There will be a winner. I am not moving these books!
4. As always, the judge's decision is arbitrary, capricious, and final.

Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway


***
These moments of contested blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

"I believe," said Sage.

A few nights ago, on the eve of Yule, I read a new story live on Facebook. It's a Christmas story, more or less, and it stars Sage and Webb, those two crazy kids from the Pipe Woman's Legacy series. In case you missed it, here's the link.

Last time I tried linking a Facebook video on the blog directly, it didn't work -- so if you're not on Facebook, the link probably won't work. Just to cover all my bases, then, here's the text of the story. Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and see you back here next Sunday to help me kick 2017 out the door.

Thirteen-year-old Sage Curtis sat stiffly in the back seat of her parents’ SUV, her arms crossed. “Tell me again why I have to go to this thing,” she said.

Her mother, who was driving, glanced in the rear-view mirror and shot Sage a look that would have made a god behave. “Because Aunt Shannon was kind enough to invite you,” she said.

Sage’s ten-year-old brother Webb turned toward her with a bounce. “Come on, Sage. It’ll be fun!” he said with a happy grin. “There will be cookies…”

“And about a million little kids.” Aunt Shannon had invited all of her nieces and nephews.
“Kerry’s coming,” Mom put in.

“She is?” Webb asked, his face lighting up. Kerry Hanrahan was Sage’s best friend. Webb adored her.

“Yes, Mother, she told me,” Sage said, ignoring Webb. “That’s the only redeeming thing about this whole stupid party.”

“Santa’s coming, too,” Webb said.

“Oh, for gods’ sake,” Sage snapped. “You know it’s just Uncle George in a red suit.”

“It might be the real Santa,” Webb said.

Sage stared at him. “You’re not serious. You don’t still believe in Santa, do you?”

Webb faced forward and pulled some string from a pocket of his pants.

“Mom,” Sage said, shocked out of her bored pose. “Do something!”

“What do you suggest?” Mom said, glancing in the rear-view mirror again. It looked like she was suppressing a smile.

“Talk to him!” Sage said. “He’s too old to believe in Santa!”

Webb shot her a sly smile and went on fiddling with the string in his hands.

“What are you making, Webster?” Mom asked.

There was that Trickster grin again. “It’s a secret,” he said.

✨

Aunt Shannon’s house was already in an uproar when they arrived. “Thank the gods you’re here,”
Kerry said, her blond ringlets bobbing as she met Sage just inside the front door. “These rugrats have nearly tripped me three times already. Come on.” She grabbed Sage’s hand and led her through the throng, past the towering Christmas tree in the living room and into the brightly-lit kitchen.

“Oh, good,” Aunt Shannon said as she fussed over a tray of cookies. “You’re here. Where’s your mom?” Sage opened her mouth but didn’t get a chance to reply. “Would you girls please take care of the cider? It’s in the dining room. Paper cups are on the table.”

“Sure, Auntie, no problem,” Kerry said, pulling Sage through another door.

“Only fill the cups half-full!” Aunt Shannon called after them. “The kids will spill it otherwise.”

The dining room was relatively quiet. Kerry set the cups on a tray while Sage poured.

“So I found out something shocking today,” Sage said. “My brother still believes in Santa.”

“No way!”

Sage nodded. “Yes way. He was all excited in the car on our way over here.”

Kerry looked thoughtful. “Maybe he just identifies with the spirit of the holiday.”

As if on cue, Webb poked his head in the doorway. “There you are!” he crowed. “I have presents for you.” He presented them each with a small, misshapen packet of silvery paper with tape liberally applied. “Uncle George helped me wrap them.”

“I can see that,” Sage said dryly.

Kerry had pried the tape off one end of her gift and peered inside. “Oh,” she said faintly, and turned it over. Something finely woven of red and gold strands slid out onto her outstretched palm.

“It’s a hair holder thing,” Webb said as Kerry shook it out and tucked her hair inside it.

“You made this for me, didn’t you? I love it!” she said, hugging him. “Thank you, Webb!” She turned to Sage. “What did you get?”

Side-eyeing Webb, Sage unfolded an end and dumped her gift into her hand. Her “hair holder thing” glistened green and gold. As Kerry helped her stuff her straight black hair into it, she asked, “What does it do?”

“You’ll see,” Webb said, that Trickster grin back in place as he ducked out of the room.

Sage wanted to go after him...but it was too late. She was flying.

Flying! Soaring above rooftops. Higher than the trees. As high as the mountains!

Webb knew she hated flying. He was going to pay for this…

But she wasn’t flying under her own power. She was in a sleigh. Pulled by… reindeer?

Slowly, she turned. Sure enough, a fat man in a red suit stood behind her in the sleigh. His beard was as white as her great-grandfather’s hair. His smile was so bright, it rivaled the moonlight on the snow below. And he was definitely not Uncle George.

“Ho, ho, ho!” the man boomed. “Hello, Sage! Your brother has pulled quite a trick on you!”

“Yeah,” she said, scowling. “He’s a real joker.”

“My dear child,” the fat man said gently. “So scornful for one so young. But then you have the weight of the world on your shoulders.” He leaned toward her. “Tell me,” he said in a confidential tone. “What’s your fondest wish?”

 She swallowed hard. “To be normal,” she whispered. “I don’t want to shoot fire from my eyes. I don’t want to be able to fly. I don’t want to have to save the Earth.”

“I cannot give you that,” the fat man said sadly. “I can’t change who you are. But I can give you something better.”

“What?”

“Love,” he answered. “Joy. And hope.” He laid a gloved hand on the crown of her head. “Go in peace, Sage Curtis, and save us all.”

✨

When she came back to herself, no time had passed. “Come on!” Kerry said. “I hear Uncle George!”

Hand in hand, the girls entered the living room, just as the front door opened. Uncle George, his ponytail peeking out from under his Santa hat, bellowed a hearty “Ho, ho, ho!” as he came in. Following him was a reindeer who winked deliberately at Sage.

She grinned. “Hi, Dad.” As he ambled past her, she looked out the open door. There, silhouetted against the moon, was a sleigh pulled by eight reindeer, with a fat man holding the reins.

“Ho, ho, ho!” Uncle George said again.

And Sage whispered, “I believe.”

✨

These moments of joyful blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Last year's spiced nuts.

'Tis the season, as you've doubtless heard. I've spent the better part of this weekend in the kitchen, making all the cookies and treats I make every year -- including the spiced pecans I wrote about last year. Go check it out, if you missed it; I posted the recipe and everything.

As you can see, the recipe calls for a pound of nuts, but I always give so many away that we don't have a lot left over for us. So last year, I bought two pounds of nuts, fully intending to make a second batch in time for Yule. Or maybe New Year's. I forget which.

Now here is where I need to mention that I have developed a habit, honed by many years in journalism, of working best on deadline. That's one of the reasons I like NaNoWriMo -- it imposes a deadline on me, however arbitrary, to draft a novel in thirty days. As a corollary, I am the sort of person who wants to do the thing and be done with it -- and so the thing I'm doing had better have tangible results. Cleaning the house, for example, is not something I'm good at keeping up with; I don't see the point of dusting unless there's enough dust on the coffee table to write my name in it.

So I set deadlines for myself. Draft a novel in some random thirty-day period? I'm in. Cookies have to be delivered on Monday, before everyone leaves for the holidays? I'll be in the kitchen all weekend. But buy an extra pound of pecans with the intention of making them this week, or maybe next week? Yeah, not so much.

All year, I've been looking at those pecans in the pantry, fully intending to make them into spiced nuts. At one point I tried to get one of my daughters to make them. Didn't work. There those pecans continued to sit, silently judging me.

Last month, I even pulled out the recipe and sat it on the kitchen counter with the pecans on top, figuring I'd be annoyed enough by them being in the way to make them for Thanksgiving. Didn't happen.

Last year's nut on the left; this year's on the right.

Finally, this weekend, it was time once again to make holiday treats. I couldn't bring myself to give away last year's nuts as gifts, so I bought a pound of new pecans. But I couldn't just throw away last year's nuts! And I could hardly make the new ones before using up the old ones. So yesterday morning, on deadline, I made last year's pecans into spiced nuts, just for us. Then this morning, I made a batch of spiced nuts from the new pecans.

The two batches look the same, if you ask me. You can judge for yourself in the photo. And last year's nuts taste fine, I think.

The best part is that "make spiced nuts" is off my to-do list for another year. I can't tell you how relieved I am. Maybe now I can get around to dusting.

***
But first, I've got a little something planned for members of my Woo-Woo Team later this week. I'll be doing a live video in our closed Facebook group on Wednesday the 20th at 9:00pm Eastern time (or, y'know, thereabouts) with a new little story about Sage and Webb. I've been inspired by my daughter Kat, who sends her friends and fans holiday cards every year with a ficlet -- a story of less than 1,000 words -- enclosed. Rather than sending mine through the mail, you get to watch me read it.

You say you're not a member? I can fix that! Go to the Woo-Woo Team page here and ask to be let in. Even if you can't make the live broadcast, the video will be there for your viewing pleasure later.

(And yes, I've set myself a deadline so I will actually write the thing.)

Talk to you on Wednesday.

***
These moments of spiced nutty blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Happy Independence Day! The turtle has been released.

Ikluft | Wikimedia Commons | CC 3.0

It was crunch time for most of last week at La Casa Cantwell, but we burned the midnight oil (and threw in a few other cliches for good measure) and managed to get Turtle's Weir out the door, as promised, on Thursday.

The paperback edition is still in process -- which is to say that I uploaded the file to CreateSpace this morning -- but it, too, will be along in due course. 

Thanks to those of you who have already picked up a copy of the e-book. You're all my new best friends. To the rest of you: it's only 99 cents through tomorrow. After that, the price goes up to $2.99. So you know what to do now, right?

Finishing this book is allowing me to clear the decks for some other projects. Today, I worked on pulling together an anthology of short stories. Most of them first appeared in the Five59 anthologies, but I'm also including a couple of flash fiction pieces from the weekly contests at Indies Unlimited, and a horror story from another anthology. This is the first time I've created an anthology of my own short stories since I put the three Land, Sea, Sky prequels into one volume, and I discovered I had a fairly large backlog. The working title for this new book is Back Home Again, and I expect it will be available within the next couple of weeks.

Once that's done, I'll turn to updating A Billion Gods and Goddesses. It appears Webb and his friends have only added four new deities to our existing motley collection, so the update won't take too long. I should have it done by the end of the summer. (By the way, my offer still stands: If you bought a copy of the first edition of the gods guide and you'd like the update, email me and I'll send you a copy for free.)

And then there will be an omnibus version of all four of the Pipe Woman's Legacy books. I'll be releasing that near the holidays.

After that? I dunno yet. I usually write something new in the fall for release in November; I expect I'll do that again this year. Maybe I'll start a brand-new series. Yeah. I like the sound of that...

***

These moments of celebratory blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Now on deck: Turtle's...

As alert hearth/myth readers know, I've been trying to figure out a suitable title for my new book -- the fourth and final book in the Pipe Woman's Legacy series, and the twelfth book set in the Pipe Woman Chronicles' universe -- for the past couple of months.

Book titles are funny things, and titles for individual books in a series are odder still. For the original Pipe Woman Chronicles, I picked Seized, a single past-tense verb, for the title of the first book -- and then had to hit the thesaurus pretty hard to find suitable one-word titles for the other five books. (Gravid was perhaps the least successful compromise, as it didn't end in -ed.)

For the second series, Land, Sea, Sky, I went for nouns that had something to do with the elemental force that took center stage in each book: Crosswind for Air, Undertow for Water, and Scorched Earth for, obviously, Earth. That last one was another compromise, as I had to opt for two words to convey the meaning I was after.

Which brings us to the Legacy books. I didn't want to do another round of single-word titles, so I opted for two words, the first being a possessive noun. Dragon's Web and Firebird's Snare worked great for Sage's books, and I thought I was done. But then I realized I needed to give Webb a couple of books, too -- so back to the thesaurus I went. Spider's Lifeline was genius, I thought (if I did say so myself).

A. Balet | Wikimedia Commons | CC 3.0

And then came Book Four.

I knew that part of the plot would revolve around Hilary's kappa, Enkou (sorry if that's a spoiler), so I decided to put the word Turtle in the title. Which meant I then had to come up with a word to go with. Out came the thesaurus again. The titles of Sage's books include terms for traps: web and snare. But a lifeline isn't a trap. It's a way out.

When I saw the word weir, I realized I'd found my title -- because a weir can be both a trap and a way out.

Weirs have been built for centuries, both along rivers and in tidal areas. They serve a couple of purposes: like dams, they can be used to regulate the flow of water; and they can also be used either to trap fish for catching, or to point them toward a fish ladder to allow them to get over the weir. (This photo is of a weir at a grist mill in Washington state.)

Webb's girlfriend's kappa has proven to be a free agent, answering to no other gods -- but he has also proven to be loyal to Hilary, and by extension, to the Curtis clan. So leave it to Enkou to develop a mysterious structure that might save everyone in the end.

Oh, right -- here's the cover.

Turtle's Weir is currently with my editors, and I believe we're on track for publication this coming week -- probably Thursday, June 30th -- but I'll send a newsletter when it's live. This would be an awesome time to sign up for my mailing list, if you haven't already. Just click here and add your name and email address. I wouldn't want you to miss the release date when it's so close.

***
These moments of catch-and-release blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Book 4 progress.

I am happy to report that the first draft of the fourth (and final -- I'm serious this time) book in the Pipe Woman's Legacy series is in the can. Yesterday, I hogtied myself to my desk and spent hours throwing words onto a virtual page, which resulted in my best word-count day ever: more than 8,100 words in a single day. It was a long, intense day's work, and I'm still pretty well fried.

But enough about me. What's it about? And do we have a title yet?

What it's about: The story picks up a few weeks after Spider's Lifeline leaves off. The temporary amnesia about Ingrid Ingunnardottir suffered by Naomi and Joseph has spread to Webb; as a consequence, he has done nothing to find the sipapu that leads to the gods' realm. So first, he has to shake off the glamor Ingrid has placed on him; then he needs to build a team to find the sipapu; and then they need to get into the realm, locate Freya, find out which goddess is really managing Ingrid, and make Her stop.

You know it's not going to be that simple, right? Because once that's done, the gods still need Their peace agreement tweaked, and Naomi's already recruited Webb to help.

As for the title...no, I don't have one yet. Enkou figures in a couple of key scenes, so the title will definitely have the word "turtle" in it. Still working out the rest. I'll let you know when I know.

I'm still hoping for publication around the Fourth of July. We'll see how it goes.

That's all I've got for you for now. Maybe next week I'll have a title -- and maybe even a cover.

***
This short moments of first-draft blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Respect, and who deserves it.

Every now and then, a blog post topic whacks me upside the head. This might be one of those times. (There's a different topic that's been whacking me upside the head, too, for the past several weeks. But I need more time to gather my thoughts on that one. Maybe next week.)

Earlier this week, I think it was, I got into a discussion about political correctness with some of the guys at Kevin's Watch. For those of you just joining us, the Watch began as a message board for fans of fantasy author Stephen R. Donaldson, but over the years we have added several forums that have nothing to do with either Donaldson's books or fantasy in general. It's been a big part of my online life for more than 15 years, and it's brought me a ton of real-life friends.

Among the non-fantasy forums is one for political discussion. I'm told the tone in there is mild compared to other political forums on the intarwebz, and I guess I can see that, after having read some of the comments on political stories at various online publications. But still, people have strong opinions, and we've all known each other long enough that folks know where to sink the blade if they're in the right mood.

In any case, as I said, this particular discussion was about political correctness. One of the guys asked how much society should be asked to bend to accommodate transgender individuals, who make up a relatively small percentage of the population. I turned the tables and asked him, if he himself had some rare condition, would he want others to respect him enough to cut him some slack?

That set off another of our regulars, who wanted to know why he had to respect someone whom he disagreed with, or whom he just plain didn't like. Basically, his question was, "If I think you're an idiot, why should I respect you?"

And I responded that I thought everyone deserved respect, by virtue of the fact that we're all human beings.

Then a few days later, along came this meme on Facebook:

And I thought to myself, if Neil Gaiman gets it, that's good enough for me.

***
This post is late because I've spent most of the weekend writing like a madwoman. Book 4 of the Legacy series is just under 35,000 words as we speak, and I'm hoping to get another 5,000 on the virtual page tomorrow. With any luck, I'll be able to finish the first draft by the end of next weekend. I won't promise it'll be out by the summer solstice, but I think the 4th of July is doable. And surely by then I'll have settled on a title, don't you think?

***
These moments of respectful blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

We come from the future?

Jonas de Ro | CC 3.0 | commons.wikimedia.com

I mentioned last week that I've begun work (at last!) on the final book of the Pipe Woman's Legacy series. One of my misgivings about writing about Naomi and Joseph's kids is that I'm having to think about their world as it will be then -- which is hard, because I kind of stink at writing science fiction.

My final project in grad school -- my novel-in-place-of-a-thesis -- was a sci-fi work called Information Overload. It was set in the near future -- I forget which year -- and the main character was a woman who worked as a journalist out of her home. Her job entailed keeping tabs on about a billion news sources at once, primarily by watching video news feeds on a grid of multiple virtual monitors that took up an entire wall of her home. I was told that wasn't futuristic enough.

Now, twenty years later, I'd argue the point. Home theater has evolved, certainly, with split screens and multiple windows open at once. But we're not yet to the point of having our video screens embedded in plaster, with the ability to show maybe a hundred live feeds at once. Think of the bandwidth that would require!

Maybe I just didn't explain it well enough.

Anyway, that experience kind of soured me on writing sci-fi. Post-apocalyptic fiction, maybe; ships zipping around in outer space, maybe, as long as nobody expects me to give a plausible explanation of how the FTL drive works. But near-future stuff? I'm not sure I'm imaginative enough.

And yet, here I am, writing sci-fi that's trying to pass itself off as urban fantasy. I've pretty much been writing near-futuristic stuff since the first Land, Sea, Sky book. That whole series was set ten years ahead of where we are today. And with Webb's half of the Pipe Woman's Legacy novels, I'm writing about events that are supposedly happening in 2051 -- thirty-five years from now.

That doesn't seem like much of a stretch, does it? Seems like technology then will be about the same as it is now -- that is, until you think about where were were technologically thirty-five years ago, in 1981.  MS-DOS had just been invented and IBM rolled out its first PC. Cellular phones were regular-sized handsets attached to a battery the size of a briefcase. Almost nobody had a fax machine. NASA launched the space shuttle Columbia -- the first reusable space vehicle -- that year. And not only was cable TV the big thing, but MTV was brand-new -- and it showed nothing but music videos.

So for the Legacy books, I've been thinking of what we have now, except a little smaller and a lot faster. Skype calls are holographic; laptop computers have given way to tablets. And cars can fly, although my characters have to pay a toll to use the levitation lane.

Am I missing anything? What do you think day-to-day technology will look like in 2051?

***
These moments of futuristic blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Plotting by squirrel.

Alert (not to mention long-time) readers of hearth/myth may recall this post from four years ago, in which I went into some painstaking detail about how I created the overarching plot of the original Pipe Woman Chronicles series. To review: I originally planned four or five books, each corresponding to a cardinal point on the Sioux medicine wheel. Seized corresponded to the East, where things begin; Fissured, to the South, the home of youth and passion; and so on. And I stuck to that structure when plotting the series, which eventually did end up being five books.

When I got to Land, Sea, Sky, I was a little less structured. I did come up with three main characters: Sue was allied with Earth goddess Gaia; Darrell was the Sea guy, by virtue of being in the Navy; and investigative reporter Tess was Sky, which can also be air and which is generally considered to be about communication. Each one got a book, nominally, although their stories were sufficiently intertwined that it might have been hard to tell whose book was whose from the outside, unless you knew what the author was trying to do. (Hint: Crosswind is Tess's book, Undertow is Darrell's, and Scorched Earth is Sue's.)

Peter Trimming | CC 2.0 | flickr.com

And then I began plotting the Pipe Woman's Legacy series, and all my careful plans went out the window.

Originally, I intended to write just two books, with Sage as the main character in both. She was, after all, conceived by a couple of god-possessed humans. And White Buffalo Calf Pipe Woman had meddled sufficiently in Naomi's life that it seemed logical to me that she would also lay claim to Sage in some way. So Earth's savior Sage, together with her pals, got their duology. That rounded out the whole Pipe Woman Chronicles story arc to ten books.

But then people asked me, "What about Webb? Doesn't he get a book?" The more I thought about it, the more I realized he should. He had enough magical power to presume that the circumstances of his conception were probably similar to his sister's (without, one hopes, Joseph going walkabout for a couple of weeks afterward this time).

At that point in my planning process, things got a little squirrelly. The plot of Webb's duology is different from the rest of the series. For one thing, the gods are largely absent from Spider's Lifeline (and getting to Them is going to take up a chunk of the next book). For another, this is the first time I've handed the reins of the narrative over to a Trickster, and in some respects he's leaving me guessing. I was surprised, when I went to draft the outline for book 4, to discover just how far afield the story had gone in book 3.

But fear not. Webb and I have had a chat, and he's promised to stick to the plan in the next book. We'll see how long it lasts.

***
Hugs and big thanks to those of you who have purchased a copy of Spider's Lifeline so far. You're all my new best friends. For those of you who have not yet grabbed a copy, the eBook will be available at Amazon for just 99 cents through the end of this month. That's not exactly forever -- so go get it now, before you forget. Thanks!

***
These moments of squirrelly blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

At long last, Big Publishing News.

Alert readers of this blog have probably already noticed that this is the third week since I promised you Big Publishing News.

Well, three must be the charm, because I finally got Spider's Lifeline out the door.

 

The ebook is available at Amazon for just 99 cents through the end of April. After that, it goes up to $2.99. Which is still not a ton of money in the grand scheme of things, but just the same, you might want to grab it now. The paperback is also on the way; CreateSpace released it today. It usually takes a couple of days for them to get a book to Amazon, and perhaps a few more to show up at other retailers.

Anyway, I hope y'all enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you do -- heck, even if you don't -- please leave me a review. Don't think of reviews as helping the author (although they do); think of them as helping other readers find a terrific book. Or, y'know, warning them away from a not-so-terrific one. 

Okay, enough of the commercial. I know that what you guys really want to know is how the move is coming, right? Well...we're in, and we're still unpacking. The kitchen storage is wholly inadequate. This fridge has an icemaker, which the old one didn't (yay!), but that also cuts the freezer storage capacity in half (boo!). The shelves in the narrow pantry are only about six inches deep, so we're going to have to put shelves on the wall to make more dry food storage space. And we've added a person to the household, so what we needed was more storage space, not less. But we'll work it out.

Today, I finished hanging the pictures, as well as the pendant light over the dining room table. I can't drill into the ceiling -- maybe if I had a masonry drill bit, but I don't -- so I've stuck it up there with industrial-strength Velcro. 

Don't look at me like that. It worked in the old apartment.

***

These moments of glowy blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

It must still be Sunday somewhere: moving edition.

I promised you Big Publishing News this week, didn't I? Oh haha, I am hilarious.

I just spent four days packing/moving/unpacking, and one of the things that has yet to be set up is my desktop computer. So I wasn't able to put the final formatting touches on Spider's Lifeline this past week, as I'd planned, let alone finish the cover and upload it, let alone write and send a newsletter about the new book. Which is sad and annoying at the same time, because I really like the way this book has turned out, and I think you guys will like it, too.

Anyway. I'm afraid the only thing I can offer you this week is this view from my new bedroom window, and a promise that I'll have better news by this time next week.

Ugh. Next time, I'm hiring movers...

***
These moments of lame blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

The Hero's Journey.

I'm crashing on some deadlines this weekend, so I'm recycling a piece about the hero's journey that I wrote a little while ago for Indies Unlimited. I figured the concept was common knowledge, but when the piece ran at IU, I was surprised at the number of authors who said they had never heard of it.

The “hero’s journey" is a story structure used in myths and legends around the world, and explained by Joseph Campbell in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces. It's used extensively in science fiction and fantasy – Lord of the Rings and Star Wars are prime examples – but it shows up in lots of other types of stories, too. Any time a protagonist goes out to find something and comes back wiser for it (or not), you’re seeing a hero’s journey.

Campbell’s original outline included 17 steps. Christopher Vogler, a Hollywood development executive who has written a story guide for screenwriters, boils it down to a dozen. You can read more about his list, and how it came about, here. But here’s a summary of the steps, so you don’t have to click away.

1. The Ordinary World: The opening scene gives the reader a sense of where the story starts out. Think Luke Skywalker on the farm with his aunt and uncle; or Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade, sitting at his desk with a bottle before Mary Astor walks into his office.
2. The Call to Adventure: Somebody presents the hero with a reason for breaking out of his or her rut – an intriguing face across a crowded room, or the little droid with a message from Princess Leia.
3. The Refusal of the Call: The hero balks. Many factors can hold him or her back, with fear of the unknown being paramount. But then something kicks our hero in the butt and makes it impossible for them to refuse the call.
4. Meeting with the Mentor: Often, that kick in the butt comes from an older, and presumably wiser, figure. King Arthur’s Merlin may be the most recognizable example, but they’re everywhere – from Gandalf in Lord of the Rings to magazine editor Miranda Priestly (played by Meryl Streep) in The Devil Wears Prada.
5. Crossing the Threshold: Our hero is on his or her way – the internship has begun, the balloon has left Kansas, the hobbits have taken to the road.
6. Allies, Enemies, and Tests: You might call this the team-building phase. The hero lines up some friends and acquires an enemy or two, and these relationships face initial tests that strengthen them.
7. Approach to the Inmost Cave: You’re probably familiar with the Greek myth of Demeter, who must descend to the underworld to retrieve her daughter Persephone from Hades. That’s the kind of journey we’re talking about. And it’s as much a psychological journey as a physical one, as our hero must surmount fear, meet unexpected challenges, and think on their feet.
8. The Ordeal: The hero is put to the supreme test and hits bottom. All their fears and doubts are holding sway, and it looks like the hero might even die – yet they reach deep within themselves to find the strength to prevail. Vogler sums it up: “You’re never more alive than when you think you’re going to die.”
9. The Reward: Having survived the Ordeal, the hero wins the prize – the Holy Grail, the sword in the stone, the girl (or the boy). But the reward doesn’t have to be a physical thing. Vogler uses the example of Luke Skywalker unmasking Darth Vader in Return of the Jedi: Not only has Luke defeated the dark side, but he’s reconciled with his father at the same time.
10. The Road Back: Now that the hero has done what they came to do, they have to get out of the place of danger. This is where you see a lot of chase scenes, as the hero and his faithful companions flee from the people who want the prize back.
11. Resurrection: Often, there’s a final battle or challenge in which the hero undergoes the death-and-rebirth cycle again. At the end of this stage, it’s clear the hero is a different person from when they began the journey; the experience has changed them in some way.
12. The Return: And so our hero comes back home with the prize – the sword, or the magical elixir, or some hard-fought self-knowledge. Or not. Sometimes the hero of a comedy will return from their journey and do the same boneheaded thing that got them into trouble in the first place.

Vogler advises not to stick too closely to this structure. Feel free to move stages around and put your own stamp on it. Variation, after all, is what keeps storytelling fresh and new.

***
One of the things I'm crashing on is Spider's Lifeline. I'm aiming for release in just a couple of weeks (aieee...) -- watch your inbox for more info. Wait -- you say you're not signed up for my newsletter? That can be easily remedied. Just click here. And thanks!

***
These moments of heroic blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

#Snowzilla edition.

This past week, my attention has been consumed mostly by snow and threats of snow.

Washington, D.C., where I live (or near enough, anyway), has always considered itself a Southern city. Which means that local officials kid themselves about the region's need for snow removal equipment. Sure, there are some years when we don't get any snow -- but most years, we get a snowstorm or two. When the first hint of snow enters the weather forecast here, people lose their minds and run to the grocery store for bread, milk, and toilet paper. Why? I got nuthin'. I've heard that the bread and milk are for making French toast -- but why don't people buy eggs, then, too? And what's the deal with the toilet paper? How much do you use, if you need to stock up when you're going to be stuck at home for two days, max?

Anyway.

The drumbeat began last weekend about this weekend's big storm. As the week progressed, forecasts called for ever-increasing amounts of snow -- to the point where the forecast for the little clipper system that came through Wednesday was largely ignored. Local transportation departments blew it off, and didn't bother to pre-treat the roads with chemicals. What they forgot was that the ground was cold, the roads were cold, and every flake of the inch of snow that fell, stuck. It caused a commuting nightmare. Some people spent six hours getting home. It made all of us wonder how bad Friday's commute was going to be. Although maybe Wednesday's rehearsal helped the powers-that-be focus, because by noon Friday, governments and businesses were shutting down and sending their employees home.

The Weather Channel has decided big winter storms need names, just like hurricanes have. So they dubbed our weekend storm Jonas. Jonas? Seriously? The Capital Weather Gang here in D.C. had their own contest and came up with a much better name: Snowzilla.

Better, and more appropriate. By the time Snowzilla moved north to hassle New York City, it had dumped between 18 and 30 inches of snow in the immediate DC area. (We got about 22 inches here.) It also spawned this GIF, which I wish I could take credit for:

The storm ended Saturday night here, so now we get to dig out. I will skip my usual and customary rant about how pathetic Mid-Atlantic snow removal efforts are. Instead, I will simply say that when I heard Metro would operate tomorrow, but with service so limited as to be nearly useless, I knew it was a matter of time before the whole region surrendered and decided to close for at least one more day.

Snow days give us time to relax and get to some things we don't normally have time to do. I made soup yesterday, and I also sorted through the clothes in the back of my closet. Today, I made brownies from scratch. The brownies were a bit of a fail; I tried to use up some leftover peppermint-candy chips by sprinkling them on top of the brownies before putting them in the microwave. (Yes, the microwave. They bake in seven minutes in a square glass pan -- perfect for when you need brownies right now.) Instead of nestling in, the chips melted, joined together, and even made craters in the brownies. The brownies taste fine, but I won't be doing that again.

***

My latest editing pass on Spider's Lifeline turned out much better than the brownies. I finished it today, and so the book will be going to my editors shortly. I'm aiming for publication in March. Stay tuned...

Other news: 

* I had a great time staying up past my bedtime Thursday night to be a guest on the Deadly Reads podcast. I appeared together with Indies Unlimited administrator K.S. Brooks and my fellow minions Laurie Boris, Shawn Inmon, Gordon Long, and Martin Crosbie, chatting about IU and indie publishing. You can listen to the show at the link. Warning: it's two hours long.

* The latest 559 Publishing anthology is out. It's called I Heard It on the Radio, and I'm pleased to have a story in it. Each author used a song title as a springboard, so the resulting story may not have anything to do with the song (mine doesn't). But it makes for interesting and engaging reading. Plus the cover is awesome. 

***

These moments of snowbound blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

The big C.

This week's post is a little more serious than usual, guys. Sorry in advance.

We were forcefully reminded this week of one of the scourges of modern life: cancer.

Last Sunday, rock-and-roll superstar David Bowie died of cancer at the age of 69. Then on Thursday, actor Alan Rickman died of cancer at the age of 69.

Their ages caught my attention because in 1984, my father died of cancer at the age of 69.

My mother lived into her early 90s, and although she didn't die of cancer, she went under the knife for cancer surgery three times in the last ten or so years of her life.

Of course, younger people get it, too. I'd be willing to wager that most of us know someone who has had cancer. I had dinner with a friend tonight who is a breast cancer survivor. An indie author friend just lost her sister to the same disease. Even children get cancer.

Did you know that the United States declared war on cancer 44 years ago? I wasn't paying a lot of attention to cancer in 1971, but that was the year President Nixon signed the National Cancer Act. Forty years. And yet today, we can declare only small victories: lower death rates, new treatments. Improvements, sure, and not to be denigrated. But still, the scourge is with us.

We have learned some important things about cancer over the course of the past 44 years. For one thing, cancer is not a single disease, but a whole host of diseases. Some of them may be caused by bacteria or viruses; many have environmental causes; some have a genetic component. Some drugs work against certain cancers, but not others. All of those bits of knowledge advance the fight against cancer. But still, the scourge is with us.

During his State of the Union address this week, President Obama mentioned that Vice President Biden is spearheading an effort to speed up progress toward a cure. Biden -- who lost his 46-year-old son to cancer less than a year ago -- says part of the problem is that cancer research efforts are compartmentalized, and competition and territorialism within the field are preventing researchers from sharing their results. It's not just the researchers, he says, who are keeping their data to themselves; oncologists and those who fund research aren't encouraging the flow of information, either.

Somehow, that doesn't surprise me. I promised not to get political on this blog, but my cynical side can't help but think about the size of the industry that surrounds cancer. The National Cancer Institute has spent close to $100 billion on research since 1971, and something like 260 organizations are dedicated to raising money for cancer research (although given what we know about some of those organizations, much of that cash may be enriching the fundraisers themselves). Then there are the oncologists, the pharmaceutical companies, and the health insurance companies. The vast majority of these people are trying to help, I know, and I'm certain they would be delighted if a breakthrough allowed them to turn to some other line of work. But it does strike me that an awful lot of people make a living from this disease, one way or another.

And still the scourge is with us.

Spider's Lifeline, the book I'm working on now, is set in 2051. Webb Curtis, who narrates the novel, talks about how the gods have done their best to remove the scourge of cancer:

Most cancers had been eradicated not long after the Second Coming, when a select few pharmaceutical company CEOs and researchers received visits from the gods, who told them where their priorities would be directed henceforth.

Unfortunately, Vice President Biden won't have the gods' help -- at least, not as directly. But I hope he can convince those involved in cancer research and treatment to cooperate with one another, and to remember that the point of the exercise is to end the scourge.

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These moments of serious blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Confessions of a marketing skeptic.

So here we are, in week two of my test run for sharing my blog posts as Facebook Notes. It seems to be as good a time as any to make a confession: This is basically the only marketing-type thing I've done for my books in months. Why? Because I have an innate suspicion, bordering on irrational fear, of anything that has to do with marketing.

There, I said it. And I apologize in advance to my friends who work in marketing, because the rest of this post is going to be about why this is so.

For starters, I came up through journalism. It's hard to believe now, but in those days journalists thought themselves above any involvement with filthy lucre. Yes, we did our jobs and got paid for them -- but we were supposed to be discerning about the topics we covered. If we were asked to write about a new store or a new product, it had better have something more interesting going on than just being new. It had to be unique, or very nearly so. The redevelopment of a decrepit retail block? We're in. A mac-and-cheese box whose perforated, thumb-sized "open here" button actually worked? We'd like to talk to the inventor. A product that would keep one's shoes from coming untied during the course of a day? We'd be all over that. (Am I the only grownup who has trouble with her shoes? Even if I double-knot my Keens, they untie themselves in a matter of hours.)

Anyway, the point is that we had standards against running stories that amounted to unpaid infomercials. (That's one big reason why so many news releases end up in the trash: the hook is too weak. If there's no real news in your news release, it's going in the circular file.)

Sometimes it was someone from the sales department who would try to sell us on doing a story on his/her client's new something-or-other. Unfortunately for the client, the same rules applied: No hook, no story. And "cool new store in town that's going to buy a lot of advertising from us if you put it on the news" was, unfortunately, not a hook. Sorry/not sorry.

From news, I jumped into the simple living movement. And among that movement's tenets -- besides downsizing your life and reducing your footprint on the earth -- is keeping an eagle eye on your discretionary spending. Don't buy something just because your neighbor bought one; analyze your spending habits and stop buying stuff you don't need; buy the store brand if the quality's the same; kill your television; and so on. These things were pretty much second-nature to me, as my parents grew up in the Great Depression. And I never made a fabulous salary in radio, so I was doing a lot of them anyway, out of necessity.

Fast-forward to today: I've let up on simple living and I no longer work as a journalist. But I still have the sort of inquiring (all right, maybe cynical is a better word) mind that asks what's so new about this thing and do I really need to spend money on it.

And yet here I am, writing novels, which are pretty close to the top of the "stuff no one needs" pile, and asking complete strangers to take a flyer on them. Karma sucks.

Plus, to get my name out there so that people will know about my books, marketing is a necessary evil. But now I'm doing business with people whose messages I've spent decades resisting, and I am skeptical of all of them. Will Marketer X give me the return on my investment he/she claims? (Doubtful, in most cases.) How much is Marketer Y relying on me to get the word out about the promotion I'm paying him money for? (Crowdfunding sites, I'm looking at you.) Why does Marketer Z insist that I must use a particular blogging platform/book distributor/etc., even though other marketers argue for a different one? Whose pockets are being lined by all this advice, and how?

Last fall and winter, I put a fair amount of time and money into marketing, and didn't get much in return. There are a number of reasons why I've pulled back since then, the Denver saga being one of them. But I'm not planning a big push for any of my books this fall -- despite the fact that A Billion Gods and Goddesses will be out in the next week or so, and I expect to release a Pipe Woman's Legacy set for Kindle just before Thanksgiving.

Which is why I'm counting this blogging experiment as marketing. It's another avenue to get my name out there -- and a fairly unique one right now. And it's free.

Anybody else feel the same push-pull about marketing that I do, or am I the only one?

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These moments of skeptical blogginess have been brought to you (on multiple platforms!) , as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.